


i miss you much (i miss you long)

by aphrodite_mine



Category: Party Down
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-23
Updated: 2011-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-27 21:43:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/300345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aphrodite_mine/pseuds/aphrodite_mine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She doesn't go on the cruise (there is no cruise)</p>
            </blockquote>





	i miss you much (i miss you long)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [beverytender](https://archiveofourown.org/users/beverytender/gifts), [entwashian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/entwashian/gifts).



> AU of the end of season 1. Ficcing a verse created by vilomsious and I for RP. Hope it translates okay into fiction.

*

He expected at least one fucking call. And maybe it's romantic, some form of dramatic irony or whatever, that the first he sees of Casey after almost seven months is the back of her head. Not even a text. Course, he doesn't have time to be angry right now. They, for once, have work to do.

*

After the tips and the comment cards are all put away, she does that thing where he just has to look in her eyes and he knows she wants to talk. Talk. Fuck, that's the last thing they need. So he eye-talks back, jerking his chin, and she meets him behind the building as the sun goes down.

"Look," she says, and its the first thing that's been directed at him -- only at him -- all night, and it really shouldn't twist in his stomach, coiling and uncoiling, but it does. It does. "I can't do this, obviously, I mean, I can't lie to you. We're working together again, and it's too weird, and I just--"

He puts his hand out, landing heavy on her shoulder. "Casey, I'm dating Uta. And right now I really don't care what you're trying to communicate or whatever. I'm tired. I want to go home." And he starts to leave, he takes that step.

"I didn't go on a cruise."

Turns back. And god help him if his voice doesn't raise and the adrenaline kick up in his arms. Coiling, uncoiling. "You _what_?" He tries to think of something, anything, but his mind is this white, blank canvas. And she just tore a hole through it.

"I didn't get a job. I didn't go anywhere. Well, I mean, I _went_ somewhere, but I was in L.A., and I'm sorry, Henry, for not telling you sooner, for -- _fuck_ \-- for not telling you up front, but I was terrified. I still am."

Henry scratches behind his ear. Suddenly, he couldn't move if he wanted to. Suddenly, he's rooted to the spot. "Enlighten me, Casey. Because I don't have a _fucking_ clue what you're talking about."

She looks -- to her credit -- like she's going to throw up. And there's this darkness under her eyes that he didn't see before. "I got _pregnant_ , Henry, and I was so scared that I just... I lied. Over and over. And I ran." She presses her lips together, wrings her hands (Jesus, has he ever seen someone _actually_ wring their hands?). "But I'm back now."

There's some kind of... buzzing. "I think you missed the part where I'm seeing Uta, Casey." (God, saying her name is a mistake.)

"Did you even hear what I said?"

But he's walking away. He's walking fast. You might even call it running.

*

(He's saying that this is good -- the two of them. That he's getting the hang of this. And she's happy, she's actually happy and comfortable and safe for what feels like the first time. It comforts her, and even though she really _really_ has to take this call, she thinks for a moment that even if the doctor says _yes, Ms. Klein, your suspicious are correct_ that it doesn't have to be the end of the world.

Except she just asked Henry to stay, and he's doing all of this for her. He's in a dead-end job, barely making his mortgage, settling. For her. He's settling to be with her and that's not the way to start anything. Is it?

So she lies to him. Spur of the moment, at first. A job, a possible job, a cruise, six months. Filling out the details is shockingly easy. Easier, she thinks, then pulling Henry aside and telling him _hey, look, I know this is kind of shitty to tell you while we're on a job, but you need to know. I'm pregnant. With your child. Your fetus? Hey, look, I just got this call and I'm fucking terrified, and I don't even know if..._ And she definitely can't ask him _do you want this? Because I think I want this._

So she lies. So she breaks his heart. It seems easier at the time. To cover for him, covering for Ron. It feels like an open door and an apology and _goddamnit_ she takes it.)

*

He'd be lying if he said he wasn't angry. So: he's angry. And Uta isn't helping.

She's watching some Very Serious indie flick, the kind of movie he would have made when he still believed in things like artist's integrity and a greater meaning. There are lots of long shots across highways, long pauses in dialogue. Essentially, the kind of shit that he hates, at least right now. He hates a lot of things right now, and he can't talk about it because even if Uta were the type of person who you tell these things to, she's his _girlfriend_ and apparently discussing the secret love child your ex carried to term is a little on the taboo side.

Henry takes a long drag of his beer, too tired to even shift his weight even though Uta's head on his lap is making his whole fucking leg fall asleep.

Obviously, he thinks, watching mindlessly as the protagonist looks off into the distance, he needs to talk to Casey. Like, a real, sit-down conversation. Some time when they discuss things like "What the actual fuck?" and "Is it a boy or a girl?" and "What do you want from me, here?"

Uta sighs in his lap. He takes another drink.

*

(She doesn't go on the cruise (there is no cruise), and she tries to call him a dozen times a day to tell him so. She stares at his number in her phone, clicking and hanging up before it starts ringing. Stares until she wants to cry with how _fucking_ pathetic she is. Stares until she _does_ cry, sinking against the freezing tile of the shower, her hand pressed flat against the slight bulge of her stomach, thinking about the night they came back here and ate leftover Chinese and watched _Vertigo_ and he fucked her right here. ("Henry!" she yelped, arching back against the tile, grinning and grabbing him for leverage. Kissing him quick to cut the cold, kissing him against the tile that warmed quickly under her back as he lifted her thighs.) He fucked her and he kissed her slow when the water ran cold.)

*

He sighs. He still -- _goddamnit_ \-- has her picture in his phone, her expression closed and just a little bit sad, cutting crudites, popping up as the phone buzzes in his hand. Henry stares at it for a long moment, finally clicking Accept. "Hello?" He sounds tired. (Hell. He _is_ tired. Uta is at work and the kid is at school and he's still just fucking sitting here with a beer at 10 in the morning.)

"Henry -- _shit_ \-- I'm sorry for the other day, that was a shitty time to talk, and. Um, I'm just. I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry too," he says, because it feels appropriate. He's sorry that she didn't tell him any of this sooner, he's sorry that they're having this conversation. He's sorry, actually, that she didn't let him _share_ this. That she didn't feel safe.

The line is quiet for almost a minute. "Cas--" He starts, gets cut off.

"Look, do you want to meet somewhere? I mean, I feel like an ass, and I _should_ feel like an ass, right? I just want to try and start to make it up to you."

Henry exhales. "What if I don't want anything to do with you, Casey. Huh? What if I'm not going to just be lead to the slaughter like this. Because this is what you do, Casey, you're safe and you're sorry, and then you throw it all away knowing you can just apologize later and it'll be fine. Well, it's not fine. It's not _okay_ and you can't make this up to me. This is _serious_ , Casey. So god forbid I don't want to _meet somewhere_."

And (damnit) she's crying. Softly, like she's put the phone down and covered her face. It feels good, for a quick moment, and he hates that. Still, he listens to her muffled gasps for longer than he should, hanging up when he hears her blowing her nose.

Fuck her. (He sends a text a few minutes later, _Lunch tomorrow?_ and watches his phone until a reply comes back. _Chan's. On me._ )

*

(After the first major ultrasound, the one where the doctor slicks her protruding belly with gel and she sees a heartbeat in a mass that could, maybe on some other planet, be a baby, she calls him. Okay, so she hangs up the second he answers. The important part is that she calls him.

He calls her back a minute later (what did she expect?) and she rejects it, but sends him a text. She's got to get through this without being a complete asshole.

(Too late.)

 _Sorry reception is spotty._

The reply doesn't come for an hour or so, time spent near tears because god _damnit_ how did she fuck this up so completely.

 _Tht i was goinf to her ur voice. Sld hv nown bttttr thento get mu hpes up_

Yeah, it doesn't help.)

*

Henry stops dead in his tracks. "Whoa. What the _fuck_ , Casey. You didn't tell you were going to bring the kid." He's backing up almost before he realizes it, makes contact with another table and apologizes quickly, realizing that he's going to have to be _mature_ and deal with this rather than making a scene. (He considers it; considers just letting it all out, upending a table, punching a window.

As much as he might want to be, he just isn't that guy.)

Forcing his hands back down to his sides, Henry re-approaches the table, trying not to make eye contact with Casey or the tiny thing that Henry can't quite believe is a baby in her arms. "I'm sorry," Casey starts.

"You do keep saying that." He sits down. What else is he going to do.

"My mom backed out at the last minute. And I thought..."

"Apparently not to hard."

"That you might want to meet him."

And of _course_ that gets him. Casey knows him too well and not at all, because whatever rises in his throat is a lot more than curiosity. And it isn't vomit either. He leans forward, gripping the edge of the table because his hand is shaking. Jesus. This is not the way this is supposed to happen. "I suppose you've taken the liberty of naming him," he says, though it doesn't sound nearly as mean as he intends it.

"Actually, yeah, I couldn't really see myself calling him Baby, so I went with Francis. Francis Leopold, to be precise." She ducks her head and fumbles with his blankets, her deadpan so familiar that Henry knows she's joking. (It is _so_ not the time for jokes, and yet...) "Sam, actually," Casey amends, swallowing hard and brushing a fingertip against the ruddy cheek. "Please tell me you don't hate it?"

He could say a lot of things. He's still half-considering the dramatic, ending-in-handcuffs exit. But he's never been good at fighting it, fighting this, so he says, "No, Casey. I don't hate it."

*

(It isn't an easy birth, not even in the scope of births she's heard about or saw on tv with a cut-away to a tidy frame reading "Fourteen hours later" where the mother is damp but made-up and the baby is clean, and fresh, and cooing. There's isn't any damn cut-away, her insides feel like they're ripping apart, and the only hand she has to hold is her mother's.

God help her, but that's not good enough.

After about a shift and a half of aggressive panting and pushing, the baby takes a break. Nothing's wrong, the doctor says, checking her chart, her levels, her heartbeat. She thinks, in that brief solace between contractions about the last time she saw Henry, that _look_ on his face, and starts crying.

She doesn't entirely stop until it's over, and then the doctor is handing her this _thing_ which is a terrible idea because Casey is shaking all over and just as terrified as ever. But the baby doesn't break and neither does she, and when her eyes dry she realizes that he looks like Henry, just a little bit (like maybe there's been a mistake and some squid DNA got mixed in), and despite all the blood and viscera, Casey thinks _Jesus, you were just inside of me_.

The nurses clean him off, and okay, he looks a little more human.

It's all so far from perfect, but he makes up for it.)

*

He tells himself he'd much rather go home and wallow through this, but when Henry realizes that when he pictures home he sees Casey, sprawled out on the couch asleep -- cartons of soon-to-be-leftover Chinese on the coffee table, her shirt undone and halfway up her stomach... when he realizes that, he also realizes that he's essentially fucked.

Hell, he was fucked from the moment they met. He's spent more energy denying that than he puts in to just about anything.

"I'm gonna go, actually," he says finally, after the silence between them has ballooned up and Sam starts twisting in Casey's arms and letting out these little whimpers. He says it, but he doesn't push back his chair.

"We'll walk you to your car." Casey nods, decisive, but with some lingering hesitancy, wrapping the kid tight in a blanket she pulls out of some giant purse. She must notice him watching her -- he's practically staring -- and smiles. "It's a diaper bag. All the things you'd kill yourself for forgetting, and then some." She stands up, Sam against her chest. "Want to hold it for me?"

So he does, feeling only a little silly carrying the denim sack on his shoulder as he maneuvers around tables and holds the door for Casey. And his son.

They're quiet on the walk, and there soon enough. Henry shifts his feet and digs his keys out of his pocket. "Take care, I guess," he finally says, realizing that Casey is content to simply stand there and blink at him. He reaches to sling the bag off his shoulder, but Casey stops the movement, her hand on his.

"Thanks, Henry. I--" She's about to say _I'm sorry_ again, he can tell. "Just. Thanks."

"Hey," he shrugs, pressing his lips together.

Nothing else feels right, so he completes the pass of the diaper bag and steps around to put the distance of the car between them. He unlocks the door and ducks to get in, turning to look -- quickly, before he can't any more -- and says "See you later, Case."

There's a hint of a smile on her lips when he glances in the rearview mirror, but only that.

*

(She knows it's a terrible idea -- Sam still isn't sleeping through the night -- but hands her mom a cup of coffee, attempts a smile, and says, "I'd like to see if I can get my job back.")


End file.
